Typical boresighting kits for weapons, such as the Shoulder-launched Multipurpose Assault Weapon (SMAW) portable rocket launcher, include bulky equipment, thereby making these kits impractical or inconvenient for field boresighting. For example, a current implementation of a boresighting kit for the SMAW weighs more than 70 pounds and involves bulky equipment including a tripod, a target board and a transfer slug. In using this kit, the SMAW is mounted to the tripod, which weighs about 45 pounds, to hold the system steady. A target reference pattern is printed on the target board, which is positioned some distance from the weapon. The transfer slug is placed in the barrel and fired toward a location on the target reference pattern. A great deal of complexity is built into the boresighting kit components to make them stable enough to be used together, thereby increasing the cost of the kit. The separation of the unit under test, for example the SMAW, from the target board further adds cost and complexity due to additional interfaces that must be provided to couple them in a steady configuration to permit reasonably accurate boresighting. Various components of the boresighting kit are often provided by different suppliers, further increasing cost.
Another disadvantage associated with traditional boresighting kits and boresighting methods is that relatively long alignment distances are required. For example, a traditional boresighting kit for a SMAW requires an alignment distance of 25 meters, and a traditional boresighting kit for an M1A1 tank requires setting up a target at an alignment distance of 1200 meters from the tank. However, alignment at long distances may be impractical in the field. Another disadvantage of using these kits for boresighting is the time, difficulty and the error inherent when aligning subsystems of the weapon to a target that is not physically coupled to the weapon, as discussed above. The difficulty of aligning the target with the weapon and maintaining this alignment is particularly challenging at longer alignment distances.